Culver is breathtakingly wrong to try library takeover

County executive has no legal authority to grab library space for storage.

Wicomico County Executive Bob Culver’s attempt at a hostile takeover of public service space at the downtown Wicomico Public Library to use for dead storage of voting machines is breathtakingly wrong. Here’s why:

•It undermines revitalization of Downtown Salisbury. In recent years, vacant buildings have been renovated, repurposed and transformed into retail, commercial and fine arts venues. Culver wants to take space in the downtown’s busiest, most viable and comprehensive public service facility and turn it into dead storage.

I’ve seen many planning studies for downtown Salisbury. I don’t recall any that cite a lack of dead storage space and the need to create more at the expense of public access.

•It is anti-business. Culver’s billboards proclaim Wicomico County is “open for business.”

Except for the Wicomico Public Library’s entrepreneurial center, which would close to the public.

He states it’s not needed. Why? Do we have a dearth of potential entrepreneurs in Wicomico County or a glut of successful small business startups? Have we reached economic Nirvana?

•Backward on downtown revitalization, Part 2. Another positive trend in the downtown is Salisbury University’s growing presence.

Culver cites the existence of an entrepreneur center at SU as justification for closing the one at the public library. If there’s one on campus, who needs one downtown?

Does that also apply to performance venues, art galleries, coffee shops, restaurants and office space?

Downtown leaders and Salisbury University do not seem to think so.

•And, by the way, Culver does not have the authority to grab space in the library. This attempt at micro-mismanagement could easily have been avoided if Culver better understood the relevant portions of the Code of Maryland and the Wicomico County Code.

Yes, the county owns the library building, as Culver is fond of repeating. But the County Code reiterates the Library Board’s legal authority for its operation.

In the face of Library Board opposition to his plan, Culver’s strong-arm tactics are illegal.

If he has any difficulty accessing the Code of Maryland and the Wicomico County Code, the library can help. It’s just down the street from his office.

Tom Hehman retired as director of the Wicomico Public Library in 2011. He remains an avid user and a taxpayer concerned for its well being.